


I know that I'm too much sometimes, but you're still here, my love.

by stars1445



Category: Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (Movies), Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Canon Divergence, Magic, Teen Years
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-13
Updated: 2018-11-13
Packaged: 2019-08-22 19:26:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,326
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16604069
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/stars1445/pseuds/stars1445
Summary: Gellert creates a world for him and Albus.





	I know that I'm too much sometimes, but you're still here, my love.

Heading down the stairs Albus could hear the sound of somebody moving around in the kitchen. He was certain it was Aberforth, making the usual ten o’clock tea for them both and Ariana, before he saw Gellert’s back bent over the stove. He slowed his steps, holding back a smile, but the wooden staircase let out a creaking noise just then, and without turning around, Gellert revealed that he was already aware of his presence.

“Good morning. Don’t you always get so thirsty when it rains?” He said.

Albus frowned. Somehow he hadn’t realized yet that it was raining, but now he could hear it so clearly it seemed hard to miss - a violent drumming against the ceiling and the windows.

“Maybe?” He said hesitantly.

“Well I do.” Gellert said.

He looked like he had been awake a long time; clothes and hair in perfect place and shape, movements graceful as ever. Albus found himself wondering why, if that was the case, he hadn’t woken him up. Seeing him there in the kitchen however, uninvited, was not unusual or surprising. Aunt Bathilda’s was sufferable for eating and sleeping, but Albus didn’t blame anyone who’d rather spend the remnants of their day somewhere else. Especially because their undertakings were private, and of such a kind that it wouldn't be desirable to have anybody nosing around. 

The kitchen was pleasantly warmer than the rest of the house, a welcomed warmth, the source of it being the hot stove where a kettle was brewing. Gellert gave him a mischievous look when he approached, before he lifted the kettle and calmly poured the tea into two cups, steam rising up into the space between them.

“I’ve made something special.” He said, shoving one of the cups gently in front of Albus across the wooden surface. “Try it.”

“I’ve had tea before, Gellert.” Albus said.

“Not like this.” Gellert insisted.

Albus studied his face, and was met with a familiar, adamant expression that preceded most his revelations of ideas, which hadn’t failed this far. With a shrug, he lifted the teacup, letting it warm up his hands for a moment. Gellert watched him with an impatient intensity without giving way, and he felt compelled to take a careful sip. It was so burning hot it hardly tasted of anything at all. He didn’t know what he should expect, and whatever it was, it didn’t come. He looked at Gellert in doubt.

“Don’t you trust me?” Gellert said.

“Of course I do.” Albus replied without hesitation.

The steam kept rising from the cups and the kettle pipe, carrying with it the sweet smell of bergamot. It seemed normal at first - Albus took another, bigger, sip, and this time found it to taste somewhat tea-like, however thicker, as if a spoon of oil was added to it. When looked up again, a demanding question on his tongue, he found that the steam was not settling down as one would expect, but rather expanding in every possible direction. In the next moment, he realized that he had dropped the teacup, or it was no longer in his hands, though it seemed impossible, it had rather evaporated.

“Gellert?” He said, fearing that he was hallucinating.

The steam had now transformed into a thick, white smoke, in such a speed he could only recognize it as magical. Getting no reply, he reached for his wand, but of course it wasn’t there. It had become apparent that same morning when he woke up, and the way he had instantly forgotten about it in the next moments rendered him with a sense of burning embarrassment, knowing who was responsible for distracting his mind. Looking up again, it had grown so dense that he could no longer see Gellert in front of him. He turned to the side, where he could just barely make out the kitchen table and chairs, and up to the ceiling, where the crystals of the chandelier were about to disappear into the fog. Before he knew it he was completely surrounded by it, as if he was floating in a cloud in the sky, the way he had dreamt about as a child. He lifted a hand in front of himself, and could not make it out. He then looked down at his own legs, and could not make them out, either. Wherever he turned, he could not make out anything at all.

“Gellert!” He called, this time reaching his hands out, knowing Gellert had stood right there, but now there was nothing. His hands grasped for a hold of anything, but without luck.

He rubbed his eyes, pointless as he knew it must be, only to open them and find no difference. Everything was, it seemed, gone, vanished without a trace. He bent down to his knees, to feel the floor underneath him - how odd. He was standing on the floor, still he couldn’t feel it. It was there, it was carrying him, but when his hand reached out to touch it his grasp went right through. With rising panic, he started crawling on all fours, forward at first to where he knew Gellert should stand, but clearly did not anymore. He tried a different way, and then another one, then losing his sense of direction got on his feet and aimlessly went from here to there. It wasn’t possible, surely, but wherever he turned he ran into nothing, in a room that was so small that a few steps would have meant crashing into either a wall or a piece of furniture. Starting to get out of breath, he stood still, calmed himself as best as he could, and listened. It was not only his vision that had left him, but his hearing, too. Everything was quiet, far too quiet...

 

He stroke the hair from out of his forehead, squinting in all directions, desperate for a hint of anything. When he gazed forward, though it was difficult to make it out at first, he spotted a tiny light ahead in the distance. Right there, within the emptiness, a beaming, beautiful light, showing him where to go. It could be a trap, it could be anything, but he didn’t have a choice. He went towards it, fearing it would fade away just as quickly as it had appeared. Half running, he didn’t care about staying calm anymore. He hurried his steps until he was running so fast that he felt his legs would give way underneath him, not used to that kind of speed. Still, the light appeared no closer, and with nothing to give him any sense of distance, he felt he could have just as well been running backwards.

He came to a halt, bending over, hands on his knees, breathing heavily, starting to feel ill. Then, just as he thought of laying down on the invisible ground, closing his eyes and hoping to wake up from a dream, it started to change. The fog that had seemed impenetrable began to give way, and a scenery appear beyond it, and from the centre of it. The light grew and blinded him, until it became a sun in a pale blue sky, lighting up a scenery. Not the scenery where he had been, the kitchen, or even the house enclosing it - instead he saw a shiny surface, huge and silvery, and as he kept his eyes fixed upon it, saw it to turn into a lake, reflecting a cloud-filled sky and tall trees. Indeed, around it was just that - an autumn sky, and trees that were burning red and yellow, leaves on the ground around his feet. In the distance, as the last of the smoke finally cleared, stood mountains with snow on the hilltops, a beautiful imagery unlike anything he’d experienced before.

He heard the sound of crackling leaves, and stood for moment in incomprehension, until he realized it was coming from behind him. He turned around, and out of nothing, he saw Gellert walking towards him, a wide smile on his face.

“Well.” Gellert said, and gestured to their surroundings. His normally pale cheeks were a little red, not from a chimeric autumn air that would be presumed in such a place, but from something else… something like excitement. “What do you think?”

His voice seemed abnormally loud and clear due to the lack of other sounds one might expect - quiet as the nothingness that had given way to it moments before. In fact there was something about all of it, although beautiful, that made it seem almost as unreachable as the light in the distance, now a sun shining down on them. 

“What is this?” Albus said.

“There is nothing to worry about.” Gellert said at noting the panic in his voice, raising his hands assuringly.

“Did you…” Albus managed then, watching from Gellerts beaming face to the picture-like surroundings. There was only really one explanation for it, the way he could see it. “Did you make this?”

Gellert shook his head.

“I made the spell of course, and the potion.” He said. “But this…” He gestured around him again. “This is from you.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean it’s from your mind. A place of your dreams. That’s why you had to drink the tea. I have to say… it’s not what I had expected.”

Gellert frowned at his own words as if he found something especially bemusing, and Albus continued to stare.

“Not that I object.” Gellert continued. “I do prefer this to a dull sunset on a beach somewhere. The mountains, they actually remind me of a place, somewhere near to where I… ” His voice died out then, and his gaze turned inwards though still facing the silver lake in the distance, mouth lingering open slightly. It seemed a memory had caught hold of him too hastily, and without warning. 

“Where you grew up?” Albus attempted carefully.

“Yes.” Gellert said, returning to face him, his voice merely a breath. “Yes, exactly…”

“I don’t remember dreaming of it at all.” Albus said. 

“Perhaps not in a real dream.” Gellert said. “Truthfully, I have yet to figure out exactly how it works. ”

His cheeks still had the trace of red, and Albus could not oppress a slight feeling of endearment. Whatever it was that Gellert had done, his intentions seemed harmless enough.

“So—…” Albus continued, trying to piece it together in his mind. He struggled to find the right words, not to mention the right sentiment, torn between ones of apprehension and wonder.

“—you created a spell and a potion…that creates a world from ones dreams?”

“Something like that.” Gellert said. “It’s not quite finished yet, as you might have noticed… it allows us to see everything, but we can’t touch any of it.”

"When did you do this?”

“Whenever I got a bit of free time.” Gellert said matter-of-factly.

Despite the absurdity of it all, the statement alone could have sounded ordinary, and perfectly feasible. Only, in the last weeks there was hardly a minute of the days that they hadn’t spent in each other’s company, either directly, deep into books and scriptures, or indirectly, trying out methods of contacting each other from their own bedrooms well into the night. If there was any time left for them to be on their own, Albus was sure he’d spent every minute of it sleeping.

“Did you take my wand?”

This caused Gellert’s expression to change into one of reluctance, enough to reveal it to be true.

“I’m sorry for that. I had to take it, because I wasn’t sure how the transformation process would react to spells, and I didn’t want to risk anything happening to you.”

“Right.” Albus let out. “Of course not.”

His wand was always on him, or as close as possible, and he kept the door and window in his room closed. He wondered whether Gellert had summoned it somehow with magic, or if he had simply walked into his bedroom that night when he was sleeping, and taken it by hand. For some reason, the latter option didn’t seem that unthinkable.

Gellert shook his head only slightly in discontentment, a hint of a decrease in patience.

“Albus,” He said, placing one hand on Albus shoulder. “Don’t you see what this is? We can do anything here. No one or nothing can disturb us…”

Albus speech failed him again at the touch, words twirling around in his mind and swallowing each other. 

Gellert kept his eyes steady in his own, and as he did so, a calming sensation started to pour over him. If he hadn’t felt it before, he might have thought it to be a part of the potion he was apparently under the influence of. Still he yearned to know more, to learn everything, increasingly aware of the possibilities of such magic.

“How did you…” He began.

Gellert lifted a finger to his lips, signaling him to be silent.

“We don’t have much time.”

“We don’t…?”

“You didn’t drink all the tea, for one…”

“I’m sorry—” Albus didn’t know whether to laugh or yell at him. “It’s a bit hard to drink from a nonexistent cup, while being engulfed in a growing steam cloud, turning into a universe of nothingness…”

“Second, it only lasts as long as we both want to be here.” Gellert said insouciantly.

It took a while for the meaning of his words to settle in. When it did, Albus looked at him, and felt that soft pull in his chest, the one that had lead him to places this summer he’d never envisioned himself going. Places not only of desires of magical accomplishment, but of intimacy that now made him blush, as he understood what Gellert already knew of him. It was true, of course. Despite being hopelessly stuck in a suspiciously grand, pretend world, with no idea what was about to happen in the very next moment, he didn’t want to be anywhere else.

*


End file.
